When a private tutor isn’t enough: the industry helping Chinese students cheat their way into and through US universities
A vibrant East Asian industry is corrupting the American higher education system by gaming entrance exams, concocting college applications and completing coursework on behalf of students
The advertisements were tailored for Chinese college students far from home, struggling with the English language and an unfamiliar culture.
Coaching services peppered the students with emails and chat messages in Chinese, offering to help foreign students at American colleges do much of the work necessary for a university degree.
The companies would author essays for clients. Handle their homework. Even take their exams. All for about US$1,000 a course.
For dozens of Chinese nationals at the University of Iowa in the United States, the offers proved irresistible.
“Test-taking services. Paper-writing. Take Online Courses for you,” says the social-messaging profile of one Chinese coaching outfit used by Iowa students, UI International Student Services.
A pitch emailed from another business ended with this reassuring claim: “Your friends are all using us.”